Will Collin Sexton be a Rookie of the Year candidate by year’s end?

Cleveland Cavaliers point guard Collin Sexton, the eighth overall pick in the 2018 NBA Draft, has a great chance to win the Rookie of the Year award.

Meet Collin Sexton, a 19-year-old known by the moniker “Young Bull,” who is the face of the Cleveland Cavaliers franchise in an apocalyptic post-LeBron era.

Standing at 6-foot-3 and 190 pounds, with 6-foot-6.5 inch wingspan, Sexton isn’t physically imposing though he has solid size for the position. His wiry frame, track-level speed and wild mane give Sexton the look of a young lion charging at his prey when he’s on the court rather than a young bull.

It wasn’t always like this for Sexton though. Despite picking up the game of basketball at the tender age of 3-years-old, showing a natural affinity for the sport, his future NBA prospects were doubted from a young age because of his perceived lack of talent and a lack of coachability.

He would prove his doubters wrong, leading his high school team to the 2016 Georgia Region 3-6A title and the 2016 Georgia Class 6A State Championship game as a junior. He averaged 32.6 points per game as a senior, leading his team to a 21-8 record. He would also earn MVP honors in the 2016 FIBA U-17 World Championship.

After showcasing his abilities and earning the prestigious labels of a five-star recruit and McDonald’s All-American, Sexton took his talents across the state border to Alabama in order to learn from University of Alabama men’s basketball head coach Avery Johnson, a longtime NBA point guard who won a championship with the San Antonio Spurs.

Johnson would help prepare Sexton for the NBA-level with his basketball acumen and first-hand experiences behind-the-scenes while Sexton would turn heads between-the-lines, becoming the first player at Alabama to earn SEC Co-Freshman of the Year honors since former Cav Mo Williams.

Sexton scored 20 or more points 16 times in 33 games at Alabama, including a 40-point effort against the University of Minnesota with his team down to three players.

Though fan favorite Cedi Osman stole the headlines early with his performances in Summer League, Sexton was hearing his name said with high praise from the media as he went toe-to-toe with other praised point guard prospects like Aaron Holiday and DeAnthony Melton and came out on top.

There was perhaps no better performance for Sexton than his final Summer League appearance, where he would score 27 points in face-off against NBA Summer League MVP Josh Hart and the Los Angeles Lakers.

In a world where power forward Kevin Love is the lone All-Star and the best perimeter playmaker under contract for the Cavs  — outside of Sexton — is pass-first point guard George Hill, the statistical output Sexton could have in 2018-2019 could be enough to turn heads.

Even if the Cleveland Cavaliers come to terms with restricted free agent Rodney Hood, a scoring-minded player, Sexton will be able to simply because Sexton and Hood’s play styles and skillsets complement each other’s so thoroughly.

Furthermore, with the absence of LeBron comes the absence of the 27.5 points and 9.1 assists per game he averaged last season. Sexton, who will be the team’s primary ball-handler with point-forward LeBron in L.A., will have more chances than any other player to fill the void left by LeBron.

Love, who averaged 17.6 points per game last season, can feasibly raise his scoring average to nearly 25.0 points per game. However, that still leaves 20.1 points per game missing because of LeBron’s departure.

If Hood re-signs and his average looks more like the 16.8 points per game he averaged with the Utah Jazz before his trade to the Cleveland Cavaliers rather than the 10.8 points per game he averaged with the Cavs in the regular season, there’s still 14.1 points left behind in LeBron’s absence.

LeBron’s absence doesn’t even factor in the fact that trading Kyrie Irving had already left another scoring void, one that Isaiah Thomas was supposed to fill. If the Cleveland Cavaliers hope to reclaim the level of offensive prowess they had in 2016-2017, Kyrie’s 25.2 points per game needed to be replaced.

Add together LeBron’s remaining void of 14.1 points per game from last season and Kyrie’s 25.2 points per game from the 2016-2017 season and that’s 39.3 points per game still up for the taking. You would think that Love would have had a better scoring average without Kyrie around but his scoring averaged dropped by 1.4 points from 2016-2017 to 2017-2018.

So 41.7 points. If they were to play at their optimal level, which requires ample floor spacing and a fast-paced attack, that’s enough of a void for Sexton to average 20.0 points per game, Hood to bring his (2017-2018 Utah Jazz) scoring average of 16.8 points per game up to 20.0 points per game and for second-year small forward Cedi Osman to average above 15.0 points per game in a Most Improved Player campaign.

If Sexton averages 15.0-20.0 points per game, along with 3.0-5.0 assists per game, he’ll be a Rookie of the Year frontrunner, not just a candidate.

This is a distinct possibility, particularly because Sexton plays a premium position in the NBA that is certainly the most popular, if not the most important.

Another factor in Sexton’s Rookie of the Year campaign is star power.

Sexton is quickly making a name for himself in the NBA, his on-court intensity and the fury with which he attacks the rim providing him with a label as a must-see player with unexpected entertainment value this early in his career. Then, when you hear him in interviews, the soft-spoken young man is all about winning.

The #YoungBullChallenge, inspired by the hilariously intense defensive stance Sexton took in guarding Los Angeles Lakers point guard Josh Hart in the final seconds of regulation in the semifinal round of the Summer League tournament, has become a national craze that even LeBron James has participated in.

Then there are the videos of him trash-talking Penny Hardaway’s son on the court.

Or staring down an opponent trying to get in his head at the free-throw line.

DeAndre Ayton, Luka Doncic, Mo Bamba, Marvin Bagley III, Kevin Knox, Trae Young and Miles Bridges will get plenty of attention from the media and opportunity from their respective teams to have a Rookie of the Year campaign.

However, Sexton has just as much of a chance as any player to win the award. If he does win, he’ll be the first Cavalier to win the award since the man whose jersey number he’s taken as his own. Kyrie.

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*Unless otherwise referenced, all stats gathered from www.basketball-reference.com